Rubbing Salt in Peasants' Wounds

Salt in their Wounds

Nearly every ruler on the Russian throne withstood large or small popular revolts. In the days of old, people mainly protested abuses of power by the tsar's dignitaries, turning to the tsar himself for help and justice, believing that the tsar knew nothing about the evil or cruel actions of his servants.

There have been many reasons for popular uprisings throughout Russian history. But a special place among revolts is occupied by those concerned with life's simplest necessities, such as salt, bread, matches, and honey. The demand for and prices of these items fluctuated, but the people’s relationship to them was constant and unchanging throughout centuries of Russian history. These necessities became a unique barometer for the political and economic life of Russia. For example, before World War I was declared in 1914, the people already knew that war was inevitable, not because they followed the movement of the world's political powers, but because matches and salt disappeared from the markets. Exactly the same thing happened on the eve of World War II. In former centuries, rising prices or the imposition of some kind of limit on salt, bread, matches, honey, or vodka evoked furious protests from the broadest segments of the population.

It was because of these things -- salt, bread, honey, and vodka -- that 350 years ago, on June 12th, 1648, a huge revolt flared up in Moscow, later spreading to Pskov and Novgorod. The reason for the revolt was the growing shortage of and the high taxes levied on these everyday necessities. These taxes were the veritable drop that overfilled the cup of patience among the people. There were already taxes on everything, but the people took the taxes on salt, bread, and honey as theft by the tsar's dignitaries, who kept inventing new schemes to line their pockets by stealing from ordinary Russians. The rebellion of 1648, which has entered historical text as "the Salt Rebellion," was all the more meaningful because it occurred during the reign of one of the most sensible and peaceful Russian statesmen -- Alexei Mikhailovich, who for his devotion and his gentle and kind disposition was called "Tishaishy" - "the quietest."

Obviously quite a bit of exaggeration is contained in this designation. It is more representative of the people's wish for such a tsar, than of the actual features of  Alexei Mikhailovich. However, much in the tsar's personality does deserve a great deal of respect: he really was very devout, observed churches rites and orders and tried to live with Christian reserve. These qualities turned out to have a large influence on official business and his day-to-day interactions with people, especially the boyars to whom he granted the opportunity to help lead the country. He had a remarkable statesman's mind: central power was strengthened under his reign, the rights of peasants were formalized, Ukraine, Smolensk, and various northern lands were united or reunited with Russia. In many ways, Alexei helped pave the way for the reforms of his son Peter I: he didn't reject innovations that came from the West, while at the same time he believed in the old ways.

Alexei took over the throne when he was only 15 years old. At this age, he couldn't rule the kingdom without the help of guardians and advisors. When Alexei was still a baby, his father, Tsar Mikhail, chose the boyarin Boris Morozov to be the boy’s guardian, educator and tutor. Mikhail did not see through Morozov's external facade of pleasant and amiable manners, peaceful well-wishing and wisdom to the cunning, jealous, greedy and immoral person that Morozov really was. Even the young Alexei couldn't see his true face: he was sincerely devoted to Morozov, respected and esteemed his tutor with endless devotion, and thought of him as the best of the boyars.

When Alexei became tsar, Morozov was made first magnate in the kingdom. On Morozov's advice, Alexei chose the daughter of the boyarin Miloslavsky, Maria, as his wife. The Miloslavskys were among Morozov's closest relatives. But Morozov didn't stop at this: after a year he himself married Anna, sister of the young Maria, and in so doing became a relative of the tsar. Thus, he was able to give important posts in the kingdom to his relatives and closest friends, among whom were courtiers like Pleshcheev, Trakhaniotov, Chistov, infamous extortionists, bribe takers, and oppressors. The Morozov-Miloslavskiy clan was like a herd of predators; they shamelessly robbed Russia and her people by taking advantage of the trusting young tsar.

The people, who respected and loved Tsar Alexei, refrained for a long time from complaining about the tsar's relatives, who were crushing them under the weight of heavy taxes. Only when the clique levied their taxes on the most basic necessities -- salt, honey, bread, and vodka -- did the rebellion flare up in Moscow. Crowds of people broke into the homes of the boyars. The residences of Morozov, Miloslavsky, Trakhaniotov, Pleshchev and Chistov were ruined and destroyed. The latter three were killed; Morozov and Miloslavsky hid in the tsar's palace, whence the rebelling crowds headed, demanding of Tsar Alexei that he turn the two scoundrels out and give them a well-deserved punishment. Though the tsar defended them, he found out about the crimes of his former favorites, in whom he had had so much faith. In Moscow the rebellion ended bloodlessly: the people believed in the tsar who promised to restore justice. In Novgorod and Pskov the people rebelled longer and Tsar Alexei was forced to send troops to suppress the insurrection -- not without bloodshed.

And so the rebellion of 1648 came to an end. The reign of Alexei Mikhailovich was destined to live through another, even more terrible rebellion -- a full-fledged peasant revolt under the direction of the popular leader Stepan Razin. Still later, from 1773-75, during the reign of Catherine II, Russia was shaken by the popular insurrection lead by Emilyan Pugachev. It was these terrible lessons from centuries past that haunted Russian emperors in the 19th century, leading them to fear popular demands for reform as tantamount to popular revolt.

In Brief

We begin this combined June/July calendar by noting and celebrating International Children’s Day (June 1 ), which provided the theme for our lead story on adoptions in Russia (see page 10).

In a less auspicious anniversary, 90 years ago a gigantic meteorite fell to earth in the Russian region of Tunguska. On the early morning of June 30, 1908 many Siberians witnessed  a gigantic fireball streaking through the sky, eclipsing the sunlight. The fireball fell in the taiga -- in the area of the river Podkamennaya Tunguska -- setting fire to the taiga and creating an unprecedented thunderous crash and roar. The first expedition reached the site of the meteorite’s impact only in 1927. All the trees over an area of 2,000 square kilometers were uprooted and their roots faced ground zero of the explosion. Evidence of fire could be seen everywhere. Yet the expedition could not find neither debris nor a crater from the impact. A supposition was made that the Tunguska meteorite was just the nucleus of a comet which exploded upon penetrating dense layers of the atmosphere. Other interpretations exist too, but the mystery of the Tunguska meteorite remains unsolved to the present day.

Our geographical theme continues with the next date: June 2 is the 190th anniversary of the birth of Russian geographer-researcher Lavrenty Zagoskin (1808-1890). From 1842-1844, Zagoskin conducted very important research in Alaska, in the coastal area of Norton and Kotzebue Sounds. In the basins of the rivers Yukon and Kuskokwim, he studied the flow of the Koyukuk river and discovered the mountain range separating Yukon from the eastern coast of Norton. Zagoskin was also the first European to research the day-to-day life of the native populations of the northwestern part of North America. The results of his expeditions were published in his work, A walking description of a portion of Russian territories in America executed in 1842, 1843 and 1844. Two decades later, on March 30, 1867, Russia sold Alaska to the US for $7.2 million, i.e. at two cents an acre. The majority of US congressmen at the time found this purchase vain and pointless, while Russians thought they had made a great deal. Only Secretary of State William Seward foresaw the future of this mineral-rich land.

Luckily, not all Russian diplomacy has ended in such a manner. One of the glorious pages in the history of Russian diplomacy was written by the famous Count Alexander Gorchakov, the 200th anniversary of whose birth was widely celebrated in Russia (Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov even made a special address at a scientific conference dedicated to Gorchakov) on June 15. Gorchakov held the posts of first secretary in the Russian embassies in London and Rome; he served as councillor in Vienna and plenipotentiary councillor in Stuttgart. In 1856 he became foreign minister, replacing Nesselrode, and held this post until 1882. In 1871, he succeeded in securing the cancellation of the restrictive clauses of the Paris Agreement of 1856, under which Russia was barred from having its fleet on the Black Sea and also from building fortifications on the Black Sea coast. In the build up to the Russian-Turkish War of 1877-1878, Count Gorchakov secured the alliance of three emperors (Russian, German and Austro-Hungarian) as well as the neutrality of European states in the Russian-Turkish war.

On June 16, Russian lovers of classical music will mark the 125th anniversary of the famous singer Antonina Nezhdanova (1873-1950), who sang more than 700 romances and arias from the most famous operas of both Russian and Western European composers. Her rich repertoire also included folk songs and duets.

July 1998 is rich both in Soviet and Russian history. Eighty years ago, on July 7, the Bolsheviks crushed the revolt of the leftist SRs (socialist-revolutionaires) who opposed the Bolsheviks on the issue of the Brest-Litovsk Treaty with Germany. In order to sabotage the agreement, SR terrorists killed the German ambassador Mirbakh, signalling the beginning of their revolt. Leftist SRs also arrested Chairman of the Cheka Felix Dzerzhinsky, seized the telegraph and proclaimed that they were the ruling party. The revolt was put down by the Bolsheviks in a matter of hours.

Ten days later, on July 17, the Romanov royal family was brutally murdered in the basement of Ipatev house in Yekaterinburg (later Sverdlovsk), on the direct orders of Vladimir Lenin. The murder took place almost 305 years to the day from when the first Romanov, Mikhail, donned the crown of Russian tsar, July 21, 1603. On July 17 this year, the Romanov family’s bones, which have been authenticated by numerous foreign and domestic experts (the findings of which are disputed by Russia’s Orthodox Church), will be interred in St. Petersburg. Russian Life will cover this event and this somber anniversary in its August issue.

June 16 is the 35th anniversary of the first flight of a woman in space. Valentina Tereshkova, a native of Yaroslavl, circled the earth 48 times in the Vostok VI capsule before returning to earth. She later married cosmonaut Adrian Nikolaev (who flew 64 orbits in Vostok III, in August of 1962) and they gave birth to the first child ever born of two cosmonauts.

July is also filled with cultural dates: July 24 is the 170th anniversary of the birth of writer Nikolai Chernyshevsky (1828-1889), the Russian writer and revolutionary-democrat who was born in Saratov (see page 20). July 4th is the 130th anniversary of the birth of the Russian actress Maria Andreeva. On July 8, we mark 150 years since the death of the famous Russian ballet dancer Avdotya Istomina (1799-1848), who, from 1816, was the leading prima ballerina of the St. Petersburg ballet troupe (the poet Alexander Pushkin mentions the gracious Istomina in his poem, Yevgeny Onegin).

And how can one recall Pushkin (with whom Gorchakov studied at the Tsarskoe Selo lyceum, incidentally) without paying tribute to his poetical teacher and tutor Gavriil Derzhavin, who blessed the young Pushkin as his successor on the throne of Russian poetry. On July 14 we mark the 225th anniversary of Derzhavins’ birth. A prominent representative of Russian classicism in poetry, Derzhavin was the author of many odes, satires, poems and philosophical essays.

Finally, on July 27, we remember the writer Vladimir Korolenko, on his 145th birthday (1853-1921). Korolenko was a contemporary of Anton Chekhov and Maxim Gorky. His works and editorial articles could be summed up in his democratic credo: “Just like legs take the man away from the cold and dark, towards lodging and light, word, art and literature help the man in his pursuit from the past through to the future.” Korolenko’s famous story Deti podzemelya (Children from the Underground) echoes perfectly this month’s lead story on Russian orphans and adoptions. Every Russian child reads this poignant work in school; it has become a classic and a must-read for many generations of Russians. Find it, read it and share it with your children. You won’t regret it, sad though the story is.